Headed to Comfort

Here's a quick Friday morning post to keep the ball rolling, we're headed out to Comfort this afternoon. This is a course I really like, that has been good and bad to me. In 2007, my first year of racing in TX, it was a mudfest that turned out to be one of my better races that season. I was racing Sport, and finished 12th. I don't remember anything spectacular about the race, except battling with Hunter Grove to the finish, thinking he was in my class when he was actually a Jr. that started with us. And the mud of course. But thankfully, the mud there is more of a wet soupy mud that just splashes on you, not the nasty sticky mud that destroys your bike. It's looking a little wet this weekend, too, so we could see similar conditions. This is an omnium, too, with a Short Track and Time Trial on Sat., combined with the Cross-Country on Sunday.


Last year, it wasn't so good to me. I was still racing Sport, but doing much better as it was my second year and I had learned a lot and improved my fitness a lot. I started well, but flatted about five minutes into the race. So I was back to dead last, and after fixing the flat it took me a bit to get back into the groove. I finally got going and rode strong to the end up to 11th, which was not normal for me to finish outside the top 10 that season. So it was a good day for my fitness, but an unfortunate race.

This has been a tough week, I've been sick all week and finally got to the Dr. yesterday. Got a shot and some meds, so hopefully I'll be feeling ok for the race. He said it was ok to go and race, so go I will. Of course, the tough week started before that, when my car was broken into Friday night and my Zune, FM transmitter, work laptop, and team Oakleys were stolen. This pretty much ruined my birthday weekend, but I guess I survived. Raine and James took me out for Hibachi grill Sat. night, so that cheered me up, and then we had a great small group party Sunday night at Brandon and Jessica's. Mike's birthday was Sat., so we had a mutual birthday cake. With 15 candles, LOL. 40-25=15 was the logic. I love all those folks. It made my weekend better, for sure.

And then, I got a call yesterday that I might have to go offshore Sunday or Monday for 2-3 weeks. :( I want to go offshore, but that's a long time to be off the bike and away from Raine. And our 20-week ultrasound is Tuesday, it would really be a bummer to miss that. I hope I don't have to go, or it at least gets pushed back some. I will have to be back by May, because I will not miss the Lake Lake race and we're leaving on Vacation the 8th. We'll see what happens. Now I gotta walk the dog and head to work, more blogging after the race.

Ouachita Challenge 2009

So here it is, finally, the post. Took a week but it's been a tough one. Here's how it went down...

The Brain and I pulled out of Houston last Saturday morning, I picked him up from his apartment at 6AM. Having forgotten the cycling GPS I borrowed to use during the race, I drove all the way back out to the house to get it. So we didn't actually leave here until about 6:45. We stopped for lunch in Dierks, AR. There wasn't much to the town, but we needed to eat, and I saw a sign for a deli/meat market place on Main Street. So thinking this would be an interesting experience, we pulled in.(thanks Google Street View, lol)
There were two rotund old dudes sitting near the counter who welcomed us in, and Brain and I milled around for a few minutes looking for some lunch. It was more a general store than a deli/meat market, or so it appeared, so we approached the guys about some lunch. Guy #2 recommended having guy #1(the owner, we guessed) make us some sandwiches. I picked a hot link BBQ sandwich, and Brain went with a standard turkey sandwich. So while guy #1 was in the back fixing sandwiches, we chatted with guy #2. This dude was as country hick as I am skinny, and I reverted pretty quickly back to my country roots during the course of our conversation. He claimed this was the best meat market in this part of the country, and people came from all around to buy their meat. His perspective may have been a little different than ours, but after my sandwich I believed him. Brain couldn't understand most of what was said, but he still got a good kick out of the whole thing. A couple bucks for the sandwiches, and we were on our way. When Brain opened his sandwich, it was huge! He was struggling to finish it! We switched drivers in NewHope, when I opened my BBQ sandwich. This was the greatest BBQ sandwich I'd ever laid eyes on, a huge hot link down the middle of a bun soaked in BBQ sauce with some sort of meat chunks on top. I plowed through it and didn't even think to take a picture. Nothing to do with the Ouachita Challenge, but worth writing about.

So we got to our cabin that afternoon, and went out for an easy ride on the Womble trail.

I led us to some ridiculous climbing, which was probably too hard for the day before the race, but it was some awesome trail. We went back down and went to another section of trail that was easier for a little while before heading back. After getting checked into the cabin and cleaned up, we headed up to the Oden school to register for the race and eat dinner. The spaghetti was good, and I visited with some friends who had done the Sat. tour. Back to the cabin where we went to sleep, prepared to wake up to 35 degree temps on Sunday morning.



When we woke up and went outside, it was actually nice and we were thankful it wasn't cold. We headed up to the school to get some breakfast and get ready to race. As the race got closer, the weather turned sour. The temperature was dropping, the wind was blowing, and it started to lightly rain. Luckily the rain passed before the start, but the wind and cold stayed. So with arm and leg warmers on and a cold/rain jacket in the back pocket, we headed off to the start. The start of the race was downhill on a highway for the first few hundred yards, after which we turned onto a more rural road. It was mostly coast/brake/coast down the highway, but on the rural road the pace picked up. We had started somewhere around mid-pack, but on the pavement, I drug me and Brain up to the back of the front group. The pavement turned to gravel, and then we hit the climbs. When the race turned onto a rocky jeep road, the flats started all over the place. Me and Brain settled into a pace, working together, as the race alternated from singletrack to gravel road. Brain started getting flats at about mile 9, and he told me to go on. So I went. I rode solid and steady, going fast on the roads and cruising the singletrack. I only stopped for a minute or two at each aid station, just long enough to refill the bottles and get going again. When we hit the Ouachita trail and the mountains started, I began to feel the tiredness. I stayed steady, and got over the first two mountains pretty well. I was in and out of the last aid station pretty quickly, and off to get over the last mountain, Big Brushy. At mile 48 or so, I hit a rock way too hard and flatted my back tire. Stan's sealed the puncture, but the bead wouldn't reseat so I had to put a tube in it. GPS shows I was sitting still for 20 minutes tending the flat, which was way too long. I was fatigued and not thinking straight I'm sure(hence crunching the rock in the first place) and I messed with it way too long instead of just getting it fixed. Just as I get everything fixed and back on the bike to roll off, here comes Brain down the hill. So reunited, we rode/walked the rest of the singletrack together and hit the road for the drag to the finish. I somehow had some strong power left, so I threw down the hammer and Brain tucked into the draft. Wherever it was flat or downhill, I was hammering, and when we hit a climb, Brain pulled up alongside to pace. We got to the finish line to finish with a time of 6:26, good enough for 49th place out of 159 finishers and a lot of DNFs.

In retrospect, it was just as hard as I remember it being from 3 years ago. I was a lot faster(almost 2 hours) and I rode a lot more of the climbs, but when you're suffering trying to go as fast as you can, it is still hard. Maybe even harder than not being that fit but riding it tour style, no rush, etc. I will definitely be back, as I had a goal of finishing in under 6 hours this year which I didn't quite make. The flat cost me 20 minutes, so that would have put me almost to my goal, but you can't argue on things like that. The time you finished in is the time you get. If somebody finished faster because they didn't flat, they were either better prepared or just lucky that day. If somebody flatted and still finished faster, then they definitely earned it and showed that I've got more work to do. It won't be next year, as I'll have a seven month old by then :), but maybe the year after.

Sorry this is so long, but I primarily write them for myself, anyway. If you read it, thanks! Stick around, lots more to come.

Baby Register

We took a trip to Babies-R(should be backwards)-Us today to start our baby registry. And let me tell ya, I didn't have a clue what I was looking at. All that stuff, I have no clue about. Glad I have a wife(else I wouldn't be having a baby of course) who knows something about kids, and thankfully there was also a handy dandy checklist clipboard the nice old lady at the registry counter gave us. The only valuable input I was able to provide was on the car seats, which I promptly began over-analyzing and reverse engineering to see which one I thought was safest and how all the gizmos and gadgets worked. Same thing for the baby monitors, too, I guess.

My main function was to handle the scanner gun. That's right, I was packin' the heat. The old lady at the counter looked at me very seriously and handed it directly to me, as it was obviously assumed that the man should handle the equipment. It was a task I took to immediately, never missing a scan and always avoiding the dreaded double scan. You have to be quick, yet precise. And of course, it's all in the wrist. I whipped around and scanned so fast, those nipples behind me didn't stand a chance.


As an example of my scanning superiority, I bagged a "If you think I'm cute, you should see my dad" bib from two aisles over, with Raine never having a clue. That's how I roll.

I promise, I am going to blog my OC race before the weekend is over. Of course, I may be 25 by then...

Success

Well, we did it. Me and the Brain finished the OC. More details later, for now here's two muddy bikes, and we're two destroyed dudes. Driving straight back tonight, should arrive sometime after midnight. Godspeed to us.

Welcome to Arkansas

The brain and i just crossed the AR line a bit ago with about 2 hours left to go to the cabin. And there's a large hill looming on the horizon now. Bring it on.

Cool pic from Warda

Not much to say today other than it's pouring rain outside and I need to walk the dog. Hmmm, those two things never get along. Anyways, here's a cool picture from Warda.

And in the time it took to upload that awesome picture the rain had stopped. Nice. So now it's off to work. This evening will find me getting all prepped for the OC, cleaning the bike, packing, etc. Then one last night of rest before heading out Sat. morning.

the Warda Race '09

Well yesterday was the Warda Race. After getting thoroughly beaten the first two races, my focus had changed to preparing for the Ouachita Challenge this coming weekend. I didn't expect much out of the race, but this is how it happened...

My week leading up to the race looked like this: Mon. and Tues. off after being destroyed at Waco, Wed. 10x1min, Thurs. 4x10min, and Fri. 4mi run with 4x1min sprints. Sat. morning I drove out to Warda with the intentions of riding for four hours. This was in prep for the OC, as I haven't done a ride over two hours in I don't know when. I wound up doing 6 laps, 2 including the field of despair, plus a trip around the start loop and a few minutes of the first woods section. Probably approaching 45 miles? Had a great time and really learned the trail and got some quality trail time on the new bike. After a week like that, I had no expectations for Sunday morning other than to get two more hard hours on the bike. The plan was to ride a steady, building pace throughout the laps, and not worry about the race itself.I went out for my new warm-up run, and the legs were definitely acting like they weren't going to be there today. I ran for about fifteen minutes getting all kind of stupid looks from the racers warming up on the road before returning to the pit and heading to the start. I started at the back of the pack, and entered the woods in last place. I had the woods dialed and was easily cruising behind two guys in my class for a while until I found a spot to pass. I just put it on low Z4 cruise control from there in hopes that I could hold that until the end. I was feeling great and started picking off a few guys in my class here and there. At the beginning of the second lap a group of five 30-39 guys were coming up behind me and took a huge chunk of time between the finish and the entrance to the woods, and then blew by me on the fence line straight where you pop out of the woods for a little bit. When we hit the singletrack again I was back on their wheel with my heartrate DROPPING. I was easily cruising right behind them through the rest of the woods until we hit the fence headed back towards gas pass, when I settled back into my cruise control and they dropped the hammer in the no skills required section to put me off the back. At the beginning of the 4th lap, I was going harder to finish strong and saw 2 guys in my class going around the pond as I was coming down the hill. I caught, passed, and pulled away from them in the woods, and I think I passed two others that lap as well. I was headed back to Gas Pass trying to keep them behind me when I saw Scott Schaefer(friend in the old expert class) up ahead. He dropped in 15-20 seconds or so ahead and I was on his wheel before the switchback. He made some room and I made a clean, but sketchy, pass and was on my way. I stayed steady for the rest of the lap and kept the chasers well behind, putting almost a minute on the guy behind in less than a lap. I sprinted to the finish right behind a guy from the pro class for a very satisfying finish.

(Thanks to Joel from www.bobcat13.smugmug.com for the pic)

I didn't know how my result had turned out, or even my time, but I was very happy with the way I'd ridden and felt. I felt strong to the end, my laps got faster as the race went on, and I rode very well on the new bike and through the twisties. Turns out I'd ridden from the back of our 16 man field to 6th place(there were two DNF's but I know I passed them before they pulled out).

So this coming weekend is the Ouachita Challenge. I'm pretty pumped about the ride, and especially after feeling the good fitness come around this weekend. This will be the most time I've spent on the bike in a LONG time, but I should be good to go. I'll update after that on how it went.

Meanwhile, Raine is really starting to show and it's so neat! We have our big ultrasound in three weeks, which will be the 20 week halfway point. I can't wait to see the baby and feel it move. That will be incredible!

Trivia: After it worked pretty well for my four hour preride on Sat., I had a deluxe breakfast from McDonald's of all places Sunday morning and for the first race this season I felt strong all the way and didn't puke or bonk. Who'da thunk?

Waco MTB Race

Yesterday was the Waco race, and as always, it was absolutely brutal. I took off the line with a little more effort than last race, planning to stay with the pack at least until the woods. I went into the hole in last place, which was just fine by me. I had no desire to blow up early so I set my own pace that I thought I could hold for three laps. I picked off a few guys here and there to move up to about 17th, but then started to fade. I bonked hard on the third lap to finish 18th, DFL out of 20 starters. Oh well. More races are coming, and I have to remember that I'm behind on my training and I'm just training through these races right now, putting in the volume to get me through the Ouachita Challenge. Hopefully I'll have better fitness for the XC races towards the end of the season which is what we're planning for. It's just tough to be the whipping boy week after week. I could open up my bag of excuses but that wouldn't change anything, right now I'm just slow. I had a decent Fall season in the expert class, so I know I'm capable, I just have to get back to that point.

Hello again

Inspired by my friend Brain, I'm gonna get back to making some blog posts. So I'll catch up since vacation. My little bro had a really bad motorcycle accident, but he's back up and walking now, trying to get back on his feet(figuratively speaking). Christmas and New Years were spent at our house for the first time ever, as Raine's family came through on the way to Austin for cousin Cliff's wedding, and my family came through on the way to S. TX and dropped Luke off to spend the week with me. That was fun, taking care of the cripple. He mostly took care of his self, not like I had to bathe him or anything, thank goodness.

Over New Years(New Years Eve to be exact) I found out some incredible news. I'm gonna be a daddy!!! We're so excited, it's just like the coolest thing in the whole world. Raine is 15 weeks along now, and finally has come out of the hard first trimester. It was hard on both of us, because I was having to do a lot of stuff around the house, keeping me tired and leaving no time for training. But that didn't even seem important at the time. I was trying my best to be a good husband/dad and take the best care of her I could. But now that she's feeling better I'm back to trying and trying to get at least 8 hrs a week.

I've taken up running a bit, as cross training for the bike. My best run so far has been a 5K at 7:07min/mile, which is decent I guess. Nothing spectacular but the gains have been awesome. Great to see times improving so fast when you first start training something like that. If only my biking would make a quantum leap....

But anyway, about biking. I have only done one race this Spring, at Bar-H in St. Jo, TX. It was 23 deg.(yes, deg. F) at the start and my results weren't any hotter, LOL. I started super slow, and mainly just rode around at my own pace. I picked off a few people in my class but finished pretty well at the BACK of the pack. While a guy I beat at Ruston last year won the race. Something's not right here, LOL. Guess we all have our good days and bad. The best part of the race was that it constituted my 2nd and 3rd hours of riding on my new bike. I was mostly just having fun getting used to my new bike, while trying not to turn too sharply and crash myself. New bike vs. old is like the handling of a Lotus vs. a Greyhound bus, but the ride of a Lotus vs. a Cadillac, and the weight of a Lotus vs. a Chevrolet. The weight difference is awesome. The handling difference is awesome but is going to take some getting used to before I can take full advantage of it. The ride is more punishing, but that is what I'll have to live with to get the other advantages. Definitely worth it, though.

So next up is a three-peat of hard racing weekends, starting at Waco. A very hilly course that is either up or down the whole time, with not much in between. So I better get my climbing pants on.
After that is Warda, a relatively tame course with not much climbing but lots of tight singletrack, which means lots of accelerations and you're going all out the whole time with no chances to rest.
The third weekend is the Ouachita Challenge. I did the ride in '06 with Luke, and it was definitely one of the coolest rides I've ever done. I'm looking forward to doing it again, and hope to improve on my previous ride. I'm not treating it as a race by any means, and definitely plan to enjoy myself and enjoy the ride. But I plan to carry some speed around the course as well. The previously mentioned Brain and Shaun are going up, too, so Sugar Cycles will be well represented. Shaun is going 80, I wish I were more in shape to have signed up for that. It includes my favorite section of the Womble while the 60 miler turns off right at the start of the good stuff. :( Regardless of that, it includes a LOT of super sweet singletrack that I can't wait to rip on.

So that's plenty for now I think. I will try to keep more regular with this thing again, as there will be lots to write about as we prepare for our baby! We still have lots to do, and coolly enough, Raine has lots of girls to go through this with. We know so many people pregnant right now it's CRAZY. God has been especially good to our small group at church, as we have a handful of babies on the way. Crazy times. I think the husbands are gonna form a support group, LOL.

I don't have a clever sign off that I know of, so this will have to do for now.

Vacation Wrap-up

Well we're home. We had a great time. Lots of relaxing, visiting with family, and some good riding.

Day 6 was Thanksgiving. We had some awesome food. Stuffing, turkey, ham, and waaaayyy toooo much pie. Pecan pie is so awesome. We did a short little road ride to town with the family and then back home but that was about it for the day.

Day 7 was Friday, the day before we left. We went with the family out to the local State Park with the bikes and a picnic. There weren't any real trails out there, just gravel roads through the park. They were pretty nice though. Lots of climbing and some very nice scenery. The pace was easy but I hustled up a few hills to feel the thrill. Not singletrack but a great way to end the trip anyway.
Look at the base of the trees, uphill indeed.
Found time for a photo-op.

Thanks to the Jameses for putting us up and feeding us, great to see them for the holidays, it's been a while.

Sat. we drove from Raleigh to Ruston, about 14 hours total. Man that was a long day. Had some pizza for dinner and called it a night. Sunday we picked up Cotton and headed home. And that was our vacation. All the pictures are here: http://picasaweb.google.com/andrew.bikerpilot/NorthCarolinaVacation08#.

Thanks for reading. See ya.

Day 5

Well we got to do some riding today around Raleigh. We rode at the Beaverdam recreation area, some pretty sweet trails there that we had fun on. The trails were near the lake, so again not a lot of big climbs, but more up and down with a few 4ish minute climbs as the longest ones. We did about 11 miles, then I went out and did the 3.5 mile loop by myself. Had some fun messing with some locals, :). Anyways, it was a good day, we just did some relaxing and the riding so it was a nice midweek day.

Day 4 - Snow!.

We got snowed on today! We went to see Raine's cousin at her college, Montreat College in Montreat, NC. It is up in the mountains a bit, and a really pretty town. It started snowing right when we got there. We went and had lunch, and by that time it was snowing pretty good. So that was cool. I didn't get to ride Pisgah today, it was really cold and wet and supposed to snow there so we decided to skip it. We tried to hit another trail on the way to Raleigh, but it was closed when we got there. :( So we're gonna ride around here tomorrow. See ya then.

Day 3

We slept in a little this morning and then cooked some breakfast. Yum. It was cold and a little damp today but we got dressed for a hike and headed out.

The Mountains to Sea Trail runs right behind the cabins so we picked it up headed East. This trail runs along the Blue Ridge Parkway and is really nice. We hiked for about an hour total and it started raining on us a bit as we headed back to the cabin. We had some lunch and hung around the cabin for a while until I had to get out. It was still a bit sprinkly and in the low 40s but I bundled up and headed out on the bike.

I rode up to the trail and headed West. The trail was awesome on the bike with good flow going up and down. I was following pretty closely to the Parkway, going on it a few times for road crossings. I rode for about a half hour until I saw a no bikes sign so i turned around and headed back.

I passed the cabins and headed the way we'd hiked earlier. After about a mile going that way I met a runner who informed me that this trail was closed to bikes, hiking only. Oooops!! There weren't any signs saying no bikes except for the one where I'd turned around(assuming it was that section only). Oh well. It was a sweet ride on some sweet trail.

Tonight we're going out for BBQ with Raine's cousin. Gotta get BBQ up here!! I'm gonna hit the hot tub again after dinner. Then tomorrow hopefully I'll get to ride Bent Creek in Pisgah National Forest before we head out to Raleigh. See ya then.

Day 2-Tsali

This was the scene this morning outside our cabin at the noc. 33 degrees and the Forester perched on the side of the hill. We slept in a little and then had breakfast beside the Nantahala river. We headed out to ride Tsali and saw some awesome views of lake Fontana.

I didn't get any pictures on the trail but this was just up the road. The trail followed the edge of the lake a lot and then back into the woods. There was a fair amount of climbing but not a whole lot since it followed the contours of the shoreline. It was a good ride, Raine did really good. I had a flat so that sucked but other than that it was great. The weather was beautiful, mid 50s with lots of sunshine. Then we came on to Asheville and checked into our cabin. A good dinner and the hot tub capped off a great day.

Vacation

This is Tennessee. Or North Carolina. Or Georgia. Doesn't really matter. It's what i'll be seeing for the next week! We're finally off on our next vacation, riding bikes all over NC. Tonight we're staying at the Nantahala Outdoor Center. We'll be riding Tsali tomorrow, then riding around Asheville for a couple of days, then heading to Raleigh to do Thanksgiving with some family and do some riding there. This is the first vacation We've been on since Colorado last year so we're really excited. I'll try to make a short entry every day and a big one when we get home. I obviously haven't blogged in quite a while, been too busy!

Another successful crit

Last night was week 10 or so of the MP crits. I managed to stay in the pack and not crash, which is always a good thing. I did get to see one crash, it was rather spectacular. Bikes and bodies flying and tires exploding made for quite a show. Unfortunately, as you can assume from the fact that I saw it, I was behind the crash and this caused a gap to open between the main field and myself. I was forced to blow it out chasing back onto the group which really put me in a spot of bother. I spent most of the rest of the race hanging on to the back of the pack. I wanted to try to go for a top ten sprint finish but I had nothing left at the end to sprint with. I was hurting most of the race, I didn't ride too smart. I was out in the wind a lot but I guess that just gave me a better workout. I've got three more chances to make a mark, hopefully I'll get my name on the scoreboard before the end of the summer.

Am I a roadie?

Good gracious what has happened to me? First it was shaved legs and my first road race interspersed in my mountain biking life, now all I have to blog about is roadie stuff. Last week was another crit race, a lot of the big hitters were either moved up into the P/1/2/3 race or sitting out prepping for the State TT race this past weekend(more on that later) so it may have been a little slower. I didn't have my speedometer(thanks Luke) but it felt a little easier. Hopefully I'm just getting faster(thanks Nate). I started up front as usual, tried to ride smart and stay towards the front, not letting gaps form, etc. A few laps in I saw an attack going up the left side so I jumped on his wheel and went with him to the front. I don't know if we actually made a break or not, but he pulled for a bit and then I was on the front. I tried to stay steady and take my turn up there but not having my computer made it hard to take a constant pull and for how long so I pulled off when I thought I needed to. We were back into the pack pretty quickly and I tried to slide into the pack near the front again and get some recovery. As the race started coming to the end and the lap cards came out, I was sitting up towards the front 2nd-4th wheel or so throughout the laps. I was thinking this was a great spot and I might actually throw down a sprint this week. But then with 2 to go, suddenly I found myself in like 20th place. I don't really know what happened, I must've missed the memo. So from then on it was just hold position, I wasn't comfortable trying to move forward with everybody else going all sketchy trying to do the same thing. I accelerated to the line and came across somewhere in the low teens.

Then Saturday was the State Individual Time Trial. This is a road event where you basically go as fast as possible all by yourself over a set course. Our course was 40 Kilometers, or about 24.8 miles. You go 12.4 miles out, turn around across the road, and come 12.4 miles back to where you started. I hadn't been caring about this event until I got called out by a "friend" to come race him, so not being one to back down I kept him on the ropes as long as possible(to watch him fume, lol) and then registered and showed up Sat. morning. I had been offered a Time Trial bike to borrow, it was too small for me but I figured I'd give it a try and see if I could make it work. I rode it twice and made some adjustments the week before, but I never really got comfortable on it. I was advised to go ahead and ride it, so I did. For reference, on a TT bike you are very scrunched and hunched to get as aerodynamic as possible. However, this changes all your muscle memory and usage so you can actually lose power if you're not used to the positioning. Having only ridden it twice for less than an hour at a time, I obviously wasn't ready to go all out for over an hour in that position. So I'm the first guy to go in my category Sat. morning, I started at 9:24AM. It was already blazing hot, I was trying to stay in the shade of the starting tent(the start line was actually in the sunshine) as long as possible. The starter said 45 seconds so I sauntered to the start line and started preparing to go off. I had just clipped into one pedal when I heard him start counting from 5 and I was like "crap man!!!" So I jumped into the other pedal(being held by a start official so you can clip in and be ready to go when it's go time) and I was off!

I had to start my computer on the fly and try to get in a rhythm. This was made harder by the fact that the first three miles include some rollers so you don't really get the chance to get onto the bars and in the zone. I was trying not to go out too hard on advice of my coach, so tried to just stay steady at what seemed like a moderate pace. As I got out of the hills I tried to get comfortable down on the bars and get a good pace going. I was doing ok for a while until my muscles started to complain about the funny motions I was putting them through and I was forced to start backing it down and stretch occasionally to keep them from locking up. This was a drag(literally!!) as I had to get off the bars, stand up and coast, and stretch each leg, costing me valuable seconds. I just tried to focus on getting to the turn, and remind myself to drink regularly. After the turn, the crosswind was now a headwind which just made things worse. The only choice was just to keep pedaling as much as possible, standing to stretch when I had to. I found that looking down at the road and tracking the white line off my left side helped me relax a lot as opposed to stretching my neck to keep my eyes up the road. So I eventually got back to the rollers, and in a moment of weakness I dropped out of the big ring up front and spun up the biggest one at all of about 16mph. What a slacker. Then when I got to the top I tried to shove it back up to the big ring to get to the line and wouldn't you know the chain falls off the ring to the outside!! Oh no!!! Now I've already had a terrible ride and to add insult to injury this happens. I tried to pedal it back on but to no avail, so I was forced to come to an almost complete stop and reach down and put it back on. Luckily I got it without having to stop and dismount, so it was back on the gas to get to the line. Also luck would have it that I got the chain back on just a bit before passing the photographer. So I dropped onto the bars real quick for the photo op and kept pushing towards the line. When the finish tent was in sight I made a hard push for the line, crossing the uphill finish with a final push at 26mph in the bars. SLOW

So that was the order of the day. My muscles below my butt(whatever they're called) hurt like crazy until about Monday, I'm sure due to being too cramped up. But it was fun I guess(how can you call an hour of pain fun?) and I did just manage to beat the challenger so I get to live to fight another day. Hopefully soon there'll be some pics posted to show. Later.

Owch

This is a picture of me last week at the crit coming across the line chasing the solo break with one to go.

I was already at 199bpm doing 31mph or so and had been drilling it for nearly a minute. That was definitely a painful effort that unfortunately didn't pay-off but it was pretty cool anyway.

This weekend I got a lot of good riding in. Me and Nathan did a workout Saturday morning at Double Lake. I rode decent but had a rough day, with a good crash and a snapped derailleur hanger(two seperate occurances). Then Sunday I did 50 miles solo before church, averaging over 20mph for the ride, completing just over 50 miles in 2:28:02. Probably not too impressive for fast cyclists but it was a great ride for me. The craziest part was that I had gone to bed at 1AM the night before and I was on the bike at 7:15 that morning. Josh Greer(college friend) was in town and staying the night with us, and Adam and Clare were over, too. We had fun, I cooked steaks that were slightly overdone but still pretty good.

Monday night Josh came back over and brought his wife Renee and their little girl Aubrey!! She's so cute and sweet and good, I was playing with her all night. :)
It was great to see Josh and Renee, we've missed them since college.

Tonight will be a warmup for the crits tomorrow, hopefully the rain won't wash away my hopes of racing.

Training is hard

Well it's 6am Sat. morning and i'm in the car on the way to double lake for a workout with my coach. I am tired and i haven't been sleeping well, hopefully my body just needs time to readjust to training. I hate being out of the house so much away from Raine, but she said if i was gonna do it, do it all the way. So i try to do my best on both fronts. Here's to hurting legs and a happy marriage! Btw we had bbq with JT and Abby last night, we love those guys!

Crit Racer

Well, last night was week 7 of the MP crits, but only #6 for me, as I skipped a wet one to come hang out with Raine before she left town(good husband fanfare). I didn't know what to expect from my legs, I'd done 4 days of hard riding leading up to the crit. I managed to hang in for the whole race, and even put on some fireworks at the very end. Most of the race was pretty uneventful, a few breaks went but were always brought back without too much trouble, there was one early crash, and I just tried to stay as far forward as possible to minimize the surges. As the race was nearing the end and the lap cards started coming out a break went but didn't have the steam to stay away. Then with a little over two to go, as the break came back Leonard from Bike Barn countered, he got a good gap and nobody wanted to chase. I think this was a tactic with people up front blocking to let him go for the win. I was feeling ok and itching to start a chase, Bike Barn has a great team and they've been controlling the crits all Summer, so I didn't want to see them win again and take any Sugar rider out of the equation. I tried to get out of the pack and go on the back stretch but I was totally blocked in and couldn't get out. As we came around a corner in the back, I saw a hole to the outside so I jumped. Just as I was punching it a rider in front of me bobbled and swung wide into my path, forcing me onto the edge of the road. Right as this happened I heard bikes and concrete colliding behind me and I was afraid I had caused a crash(later found I didn't) but I knew I had to hold myself together and keep going. I somehow held it together(skilz :) ) and jumped off the front, expecting some people to come with me and chase down Lenny. As I got my gap I looked back and no one had even flinched. What's the deal? I didn't know why nobody chased but now I could either sit up and fade back in or keep going solo to try to catch Lenny and hang on and see what we could do. I decided to take the hard road and put the hammer down. I got a great gap on the pack and was closing well on Leonard. As I crossed the line on the bell lap(1 to go) I was giving it all I had and was hurting bad. I looked at my HR monitor, 199BPM already and I still hadn't caught up and we had a whole lap left!! I kept it punched for as long as I could but ran out of steam just short of catching up. After sitting up once I decided not to give up yet and to try to keep pushing. I repeated this twice and eventually just couldn't push anymore. I was forced to soft pedal and let the pack pass me by with only half a lap to go. :( They also caught Leonard, so he didn't get the win and at least my teammates had a chance to go for it. Looking back, he may have sealed his own fate by working hard to not let me catch him. If I'd been able to catch up and give him a good draft for just a little bit he might could have recovered enough to get us to the line out front. But that's racing. One of my teammates got sixth in the field sprint, so I may have bought him one position with my effort.

Unfortunately, it was one of my teammates who went down behind me with 1 1/2 to go. But, that's racing. I was glad to know I didn't cause the crash.

I'll be back for more next week, I've officially started my training plan now so hopefully more improvement will be coming soon!